Three Presidential Hopefuls In Dead Heat

Presidential Hopefuls In Dead Heat

The presidential race has tightened in the state in the past month, and the three major candidates are now running virtually neck and neck, the latest Courant/Connecticut Poll shows.

Arkansas Gov. Bill Clinton, who expects to win the Democratic nomination at the party's convention in less than two weeks, has gained 6 percentage points since the previous poll, conducted a month ago. Ross Perot, the wealthy Texas independent, lost 7 points during the same period.

Overall, President Bush held steady at 29 percent, giving him a 3-point lead over Perot, who placed first last month. Clinton was close behind with 25 percent.

The poll has a margin of error of plus or minus 5 percentage points, which means the three candidates are so tightly bunched it is impossible to call one the front-runner at the moment.

The poll was conducted just after Perot appeared at a rally in Hartford to thank supporters for collecting signatures to put him on the ballot in the state in November.

"The key thing, probably, is that the race to this point has not seen an individual candidate capture the imagination of the public as someone they really want to put in the Oval Office," said G. Donald Ferree Jr., poll director.

"Someone may [emerge], but no one yet has. And that leaves each candidate having significant opposition, but that opposition not having a place it can go to comfortably."

Both Clinton and Bush barely command majority support among members of their own parties, the poll showed.

Clinton, though, picked up strength as many Democrats began to return to the fold after flirting with Perot. A month ago, just less than one-third of the Democrats polled supported Clinton; this month he received the backing of half of the Democrats.

Bush received the support of 51 percent of Republicans and 29 percent of independents, both down slightly from a month ago.

Perot lost ground in the past month among Democrats and independents. His support among Democrats fell from 31 percent to 21 percent; among independents, his strongest group, he lost 5 points, ending the month at 35 percent.

Perot has been the subject of a number of unflattering news stories during the past month, and that may, in part, explain his decline. Those stories suggested he has extensively investigated the behavior of his employees, business and political rivals and public figures.

Bush's campaign immediately jumped on the stories -- which Perot has denied -- to paint a picture of Perot as someone who would be dangerous if he had all the investigative authority of the federal government at his command.

The state results mirror a national poll released earlier this week by The Washington Post and ABC News. That survey found Clinton leading Perot 33 percent to 30 percent, with Bush at 29 percent.

The ABC News-Post telephone poll of 1,007 adults was conducted June 24-28 and had a margin of error of plus or minus 4 percentage points.

The latest state poll found a strong mood of discontent among residents. In it, 62 percent said they were not at all satisfied with the way things are going in the country, 35 percent said they were more or less satisfied and 2 percent said they were very satisfied.

Nor does there appear to be a great deal of optimism about the immediate future. Forty-five percent said they expect things to stay the same over the next year, compared with 31 percent who think things will get better and 14 percent who think they will get worse.

The poll reaffirmed that the economy is a major drag on Bush's standing in the state as 64 percent said they thought the economy was worse than before Bush became president nearly four years ago.

In the poll, 54 percent said they had an unfavorable impression of Bush, compared with 37 percent who had a favorable impression, virtually the same as a month ago.

As for the other candidates, 43 percent said they had an unfavorable impression of Clinton and 26 percent had a favorable impression. That was a 9-point drop in those with an unfavorable impression of Clinton, who was plagued earlier this year with questions about his personal life.

Twenty-seven percent had an unfavorable impression of Perot -- a 7-point increase in the month -- and 25 percent had a favorable impression.

Many state residents apparently still have an incomplete impression of Perot, whose undeclared candidacy is a little more than 3 months old. In the poll, 78 percent said they did not yet know enough about him to determine whether he would make a good president.

That suggests support for Perot could shift significantly as people begin to fill in the picture of the feisty businessman. Asked a series of questions about Perot, the poll found the public often split. Among the responses were:

Forty-two percent agreed strongly or somewhat that anyone who hires private detectives to check up on his employees and public officials should not be in charge of the CIA or FBI; 47 percent disagreed.

Forty-two percent agreed strongly or somewhat that Perot may be a strong business executive, but is not cut out to be the leader of a democratic country; the same number had the opposite view.

Forty percent agreed strongly or somewhat that Perot would be good at listening to advice or reaching compromises everyone could accept; 38 percent disagreed.